This movie is, I'm sure, some kind of grand allegory. It is widely considered to be a classic, and has a great deal of artistry woven throughout. It is the story of Oskar, a boy who decides to stop growing at age 3, and really, really likes drums.
However, for me, this was basically a movie about a little shit who should have gotten his ass kicked about 30 times. He breaks glass with his obnoxious screaming, bangs on his drum constantly, and doesn't seem to care that he either directly or indirectly causes the deaths of several people.
The movie was fairly entertaining despite having a ceaselessly annoying main character (AND subtitles... sigh), but I feel that it lacked emotional connection. Oskar didn't seem to have much consistency in acting his age, despite having several bizarre sexual encounters that were supposedly age-appropriate (he was 16, even though he was supposed to look 3, however, the actor playing him really looked 9... Yeah. This is what I'm talking about.). There were also some rapey parts that I wasn't wild about, and some things that by modern standards would be considered incest, but I wasn't really sure if they were accepted actions in that time and place. It was all just kind of jumbled, and I wasn't ever really sure what the main character's emotional journey was, so at a certain point, I stopped caring.
On the plus side, the movie was visually beautiful, and was set in pre- and mid-WWII Danzig, which is a pretty fascinating context. Also, there were several scenes in which people are squatting over buckets, either to bathe, or take a whiz. And, there was a little people circus. That's a pretty fun move.
I think, however, that this movie wasn't funny enough to be funny, not sad enough to be sad, not sadistic enough to be troubling, and not fantastical enough to be fully surreal. And, ultimately, I wasn't really sure what to take away from the ending.
I hate movies with that point.
I recommend The Tin Drum if you like watching sex scenes involving a child (creepy), or if you have Hulu Plus, because it's apparently streaming on there. You won't get the extra 20 minutes, but you probably won't miss it, anyway.
Peggy's Rating: two stars (out of five)
Sounds like it follows the story in the book which I have read repeatedly and always find myself questioning what the hell those 800 some odd pages were supposed to communicate. The only reason I have read it more than once is that an eighth grade teacher at my conservative Christian school gave to me when I was in fifth grade, and I cannot for the life of me figure out why.
ReplyDeleteHA! That's hilarious, and so weird. Maybe he thought you were some kind of obnoxious dwarf-by-choice. Hahaha.
ReplyDeletetehe, sadly your explanation is far less disturbing than all the explanations that I have come up with. He said something about with all the high literature he had seen me read at recess that I should read this (cue dramatic passing on of tattered copy of Tin Drum) his favorite book. The first two pages lovingly describes the rancid butter smell of the characte's grandmother's cootch. That teacher was fired the next year...
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